


I'd Rather Be a Lover than a Fighter

by merle_p



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Anal Sex, Cunnilingus, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Femdom, Forgiveness, Friendship/Love, M/M, Moresomes, Multi, No One Is Really Straight Or Gay After The First Hundred Years, Oral Sex, POV Nile, Pegging, Porn with Feelings, Post-Canon, Sex Toys, Submission, Team Bonding, Team Feels, The Proper Ship Tag was Too Long For AO3 OMG What Am I Doing, Voyeurism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-21
Updated: 2020-07-21
Packaged: 2021-03-05 05:02:06
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,568
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25418884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merle_p/pseuds/merle_p
Summary: But just when Nile has bitterly resigned herself to an eternity of passive-aggressive repression, Joe deliberately sets his fork down next to his empty plate, and crosses his arms in front of his chest.And apparently that was the signal, and Nile missed it, because Andy reaches for the whiskey and pours herself a generous serving before putting down the bottle and knocking back her glass.“Alright,” she says. “Let’s hear it.”(In which Booker works towards forgiveness, and Nile properly joins the team. Ahem.)
Relationships: Andy | Andromache/Nile Freeman/Booker | Sebastien/Joe | Yusuf/Nicky | Nicolo, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 44
Kudos: 570





	I'd Rather Be a Lover than a Fighter

**Author's Note:**

> Well, this was rather rapid descent from the heights of writing _Serious relationships! And character development! And Angst!_ to the abyss of going _Hm … so how about we just let them all fuck?_
> 
> I have no valid excuse, except, except, _except_ that all these people are annoyingly hot, and that a hundred years of exile sound miserable, and that they clearly all love each other, betrayal or not. 
> 
> So yes, please read the tags for this one, it is what it says on the tin. I’m a sap, so I’m sure I’ll be writing Nicky and Joe engaging in delightful eternal monogamy again in no time, but please be aware that _this is not that fic_. It’s still very much hurt/comfort, and heavy on the comfort, and all’s well that ends well, the characters just require a little bit more skin-to-skin friction to get there. 
> 
> The title is a line from "Silence" by Marshmello that's part of the soundtrack for the film.

The tension at the dinner table is thick enough to cut with a knife, the silence heavy with meaningful stares. Nile keeps throwing glances at the others over forks of Nicky’s risotto al limone, which is delicious as always but tonight keeps getting stuck in her throat, and she finds herself torn between the desire to slam her fist into the table or push her chair back and get the fuck out of here.

The one thing that stops her is Booker, who strangely enough doesn’t appear all that upset. He is quiet tonight, subdued even, his gaze fixated on his plate as he eats, but there is no tension in the set of his shoulders, no sign of angry defiance in his face. Unlike Nile herself, he doesn’t seem uncomfortable. If anything, he looks relieved.

But just when Nile has bitterly resigned herself to an eternity of passive-aggressive repression, Joe deliberately sets his fork down next to his empty plate, and crosses his arms in front of his chest.

And apparently that was the signal, and Nile missed it, because Andy reaches for the whiskey and pours herself a generous serving before putting down the bottle and knocking back her glass.

“Alright,” she says. “Let’s hear it.”

All throughout their conflict with the righteously revengeful Quynh, the five of them had worked together seamlessly, as tragic and utterly _devastating_ the entire mission had been. And by the time all was said and done, Nile had half convinced herself that the team was going back to the way she had seen it, that one evening at the safehouse in Paris, before Booker’s betrayal had torn them apart, a good seven months ago.

Yet here they are, stuck at a different safehouse in Ireland until Copley can wipe their traces from the world’s databases everywhere, and she has already realized, with a sinking feeling, that things are far from being okay. Booker may be back on the team, and no one seems to question his presence, but apparently that doesn’t mean he has been forgiven for the fallout his actions caused.

And Nile, after running with the others for months, after dying for them, coming back up, and dying for them all over again, is finally beginning to have a faint understanding of what this betrayal meant to Andy, to Nicky and Joe, and to Booker himself, who had been together like this for centuries, with no one else to count on but the other soldiers in their own tiny army of four.

Still, she cannot help but wish it was different. She remembers the way Jordan and Dizzy had looked at her, _after_ , the way their distrust had felt a little like dying on the inside, and she wants desperately, selfishly, for things to be better, for Booker to be forgiven, for them to come together not only as a strike team, but as a family once again.

“It was supposed to be a century,” Nicky now says quietly, his head bent, hands folded in his lap. “It’s not even been one year.”

“I know,” Booker says roughly, without ever looking up himself.

“But this last one wasn’t your fault, and we know it,” Joe adds slowly, and Booker bites his lip and nods.

Nile waits for them to argue, the way they had at the pub in England, after she had died falling from a skyscraper into a car. But no other words are forthcoming, the only communication the heavy glances that the three oldest are exchanging among themselves.

“So what are we thinking?” Joe asks finally, and Andy pours herself more whiskey and weighs her head.

“Team exercise?” she says finally, and Booker’s eyes fly up at that, staring at her in naked surprise before lowering his glance once again.

Joe opens his mouth, then looks at Nicky, clearly waiting for him to answer first.

Nicky looks down at Booker, then at Joe, then Andy, and finally sets his hands on the table and nods.

“Seems fair,” he says, and Joe nods silent agreement, and Nile sees how Booker’s shoulders slump in relief.

“We’ll get the room ready,” Nicky says promptly and gets up from his chair, followed by Joe. “Half an hour,” he adds, not really a question, and Joe wraps an arm around his shoulder as they walk out side by side.

Booker waits for them to leave before he raises his head, seeking Andy’s gaze with uncertain eyes.

“Like Nicky said,” she smiles at him slightly. “It only seems fair.”

Nile shifts in her seat, feeling deeply confused and lost at sea.

“So …” she says slowly. “What is this? Are you going to spar?”

Booker makes a weird sound, a strangled laugh, and Nile watches in amazement as a furious blush creeps up his neck.

“Not quite,” he says finally, looking shifty, as if he’s trying not to answer without actually having to lie.

She looks back and forth between them, with a growing sense of unease. “You are not just going to kill him,” she asks Andy with a hint of accusation, “right?”

Andy merely raises her eyebrows, but Booker grimaces awkwardly.

“Probably not,” he says, looking like he is figuring out how to continue, when Andy leans forward and puts a hand on his arm.

“You don’t need to be a part of this, Nile,” she says calmly. “Just stay clear of my room for a while.”

She smiles at her in reassurance. “Just an old tradition,” she says. “It’ll be fine.”

Nile does not feel reassured.

She clears the table, she does the dishes, she stares out the window, she paces, and paces some more. She is tempted to switch on the television, but she does not want to miss a noise that might explain what the hell is going on.

When three quarters of an hour have passed, with no discernible sound from the direction of Andy’s room, she puts down the book that she isn’t reading and finally decides that enough is enough.

She didn’t save the others from the lab by staying behind, and she is not going to stay behind right now – because no matter what the others may think, this _is_ a team issue, and she is also part of that team now.

She sneaks down the corridor on tiptoes and is relieved to find the door to Andy’s bedroom, at the very end of the hallway, slightly ajar. Nile sidles up to the gap, takes a moment to focus. She isn’t sure what she’s expecting – prayer, confessions, fighting, or torture –, and as she gears up for the impending revelation, she is hoping for better, preparing for worse.

But what she sees when she puts her eye to the opening still has her reel backwards and bite back a gasp, before she hurriedly presses her face against the door once again.

She has caught glimpses of their bodies before on different occasions: you don’t spend eternity fighting together without stripping down around each other once in a while. But in the past, she’s never allowed herself to look closely, and now that she is looking, she cannot tear her eyes away.

Nicky is on the bed, his back against the headboard, sitting with his legs wide and his knees bent. On all fours in front of him is Booker, his head bracketed between Nicky’s thighs.

Joe is kneeling next to them on the mattress, one hand fisted in Booker’s hair. “You know all the shit he went through for you,” he says, his voice a little rough but not angry, as he guides Booker’s head down where he wants it to be.

“How about making it up to him now?”

Booker makes a sound that sounds half like a sob, but he shows no inclination to struggle against Joe’s firm grip. He bows his head readily and kisses the inside of Nicky’s thigh, carefully and with reverence.

Nicky sighs, his legs falling open wider, giving Booker access to what he needs.

“Come on, Sebastien,” he says, almost gently, and Booker doesn’t hesitate before he wraps his lips around Nicky’s length.

“That’s right,” Joe nods approvingly, not easing up on his grip. “Take him a little deeper,” he continues. “Yeah, that’s good. I know it’s been a while, but remember, he likes it when you use your tongue on the tip.”

Nile has not exactly forgotten that Andy is in the room as well. But she is so mesmerized by the image in front of her – Nicky with his eyes closed and his head thrown back, Booker sucking him as if it’s his only purpose in life – that it’s almost a shock when Andy’s hand suddenly settles on the small of Booker’s back.

Only a shock to herself, it seems though, because Booker himself doesn’t even flinch. As if he has been expecting her, he never stops what he’s doing when Andy climbs up on the bed behind him, her strap-on brushing the back of his thighs.

Nile holds her breath, completely enthralled. The others are gorgeous, but Andy looks _majestic_ , a warrior queen looking down on her soldiers with merciful grace.

Even now she doesn’t speak, just shares a brief purposeful look with Joe, and he nods in response, letting go of Booker’s hair with a little pat to the back of his head.

From the nightstand next to him, he retrieves what looks like a bottle of lube, and Nile is struck by the odd disconnect between the eternal timelessness of their image and the lube one of them must have bought at the Lloyds down the road.

It’s this thought that drives home that this is actually happening, that it is happening _right here_ in front of her own eyes, and her breath furiously quickens even as she watches the mundane act of Joe squirting some of the gel into Andy’s outstretched hand.

Carelessly, Joe drops the bottle and sits down next to Nicky at the top of the bed. He positions himself against the headboard, rolls his head onto Nicky’s shoulder, then reaches between his legs and strokes himself slowly while Andy distributes the lube on her artificial cock.

“Okay?” she finally asks quietly, but it is not Booker she’s looking at.

“Okay,” Nicky says hoarsely, not even opening his eyes, but he reaches out to cradle Booker’s face in his palms, holding him in place, halfway down the length of his cock, to keep him from choking when Andy lines up the dildo and pushes in.

Booker’s groan sounds like it is being ripped from his body, and Nile winces in her hiding space. On a range of pain that starts with being blown to pieces, getting fucked without prep is rather low on the list, but it still has to hurt, and she vividly remembers herself the merciless sting of the first moments until the body adjusts to the object sliding inside.

Andy goes slow but steady, not stopping until she’s bottomed out. She gives Booker a brief moment to recover, and then she starts fucking him at a brutal pace. Her hands are splayed wide against his back as she pushes him forward into Nicky, then drags him back and slams into him again, and Booker lets himself be handled, showing no sign of struggle even when the only thing between him and suffocation seems to be Nicky’s steady hand on his jaw.

They are in synch. Nile feels in awe at the familiar ease that guides their motions, like they know each other’s every movement by heart. Seeing them here is not unlike watching them fighting, in the practiced moves of a complex, _breathtaking_ choreography – except this time, the weapons they wield are their bodies, and they are not using them to kill.

Nicky has been mostly still up to this moment, but now even his breath starts to quicken, his chest fluttering visibly with every inhale and exhale. Joe lets his own cock slip out of his fingers to run his hand across Nicky’s chest. 

“Are you close?” Nile hears him murmuring into the curve of his lover’s neck, and Nicky nods breathlessly as Joe’s fingers graze his nipple with deliberate care.

“ _Si_ ,” he says, his eyes now wide open, and his gaze locks with Andy’s as she slows down her pace, just enough for Booker to dedicate his full attention to Nicky's cock once again.

“You heard the man,” she says, kindly but firmly, and Booker nods assent as well as he is able with the peculiar position he is in.

“ _Stai andando molto bene_ ,” Nicky says quietly, the last words transitioning into a moan, and Nile physically _feels_ the sweet ache low in her spine when he comes at last, with Joe’s hand on his chest and Joe’s mouth on his neck and Booker swallowing everything he gives him and waiting for more.

For just a moment, everything slows. Time is suspended – powerless against the force of these four –, and Nicky watches them breathe in unison, like one single living entity.

“Good boy,” Andy finally says lightly and gently pats Booker’s back, and Booker gasps for air and shudders, his head still in Nicky’s lap. 

Andy pulls out then, and Booker struggles to keep his balance without her to hold him up. He sags forward onto his elbows, but isn’t given any time to relax, because already Joe is there behind him, ready to take over Andy’s place.

Andy crawls off the bed to give him space, unstrapping the harness while she moves, and only when she stands and slides the other end of the dildo out from inside her, Nile realizes with a jolt that when she was fucking Booker, she was fucking herself as well.

Nile feels the heat race through her body as she watches Andy claim one of the armchairs, settle in with spread legs, and guide a hand between her thighs. Behind the door, Nile mirrors her movement without even thinking, her hand slipping into her leggings, her palm pressing down gently against her own aching clit.

She watches Andy with rapt attention, and Andy’s eyes are trained on Joe, who fucks Booker slowly while his eyes lock with Nicky’s over the glistening expanse of Booker’s sweat-slick back.

“You look beautiful,” Nicky says, to one or the other or both of them. He’s got one of his hands on Booker’s neck, the other stretched long to link his fingers with Joe’s and then settle their joint hands against the curve of Booker’s spine.

“It’s time,” Joe finally says, into the small pause between two steady strokes. “Touch yourself.”

And Nile knows, _knows_ he is talking to Booker, but her body responds to his words just the same, and she is rubbing her fingers through her own wetness while Booker slowly reaches down to jerk himself clumsily with an unsteady hand.

But she stops herself before she reaches her climax, desperate not to miss a single detail of the scene playing out in front of her, lets herself watch as Joe tenses and shudders, as Booker comes apart underneath him, as Andy throws her head back in a moment of ecstasy, looking glowing and radiant and not mortal at all.

Finally, their bodies still, and Nile –

Nile must have sighed. Or maybe she moved, making the floorboards creak faintly under her weight.

One way or another, she feels her arousal shift into panic when she suddenly sees them take notice, when their heads turn at once, expressing alert first, then relief, then … something else.

She can’t begin to tell what the others are thinking, but she sees the changes in Booker’s face: the moment he realizes she has seen them, the moment peaceful exhaustion gives away to the quickly growing tendrils of shame.

Nile can’t bear the thought that she might have undone what the others have just so carefully mended with one small accidental sound. But like back at the lab, it’s all on her now: her responsibility, her choice.

She steps into the room, the flutter in her chest betraying the practiced confidence of her stance.

“Nile …” Andy says, her eyes too observant, and Nile straightens her shoulders and tries for a smile.

“I am part of this team now, right?” she asks, a challenge, and watches the others share looks as they ponder her response.

“You are,” Nicky says finally, and Nile carefully nods.

“Well, then …” she says, and heads for the second, unoccupied armchair before she can lose her courage or change her mind. Still standing, she slides off her leggings, letting them pool carelessly at her bare feet. After a second of hesitation, she also steps out of her panties before she sits to face the others, spreading her legs a little as she leans back.

They stare at her for a moment, a little uncertain, and she feels a prickle of satisfaction that she was able to catch them by surprise. But she isn’t here to gloat or to push them, she is here to complete the team, and so she lets her legs fall open wider and gives Booker an encouraging smile.

“Go on then,” Joe finally tells him, a hand against his back to urge him on, and Nile watches the warring emotions cross Booker’s features as he slides off the bed and crawls towards her, barely hesitating before he settles in at her feet.

“Tell him how you like it,” Andy says quietly, her voice a caress on Nile’s hypersensitive skin.

“Two fingers inside and your tongue,” Nile tells Booker plainly, and sees the conflict in his eyes give way to an expression of gratitude and relief.

At first, his fingers are careful inside her, until she says “ _harder_ ” and lifts her hips. He obeys and presses in deeper while he laps at her labia, tongues her clit, and she lets him have it as she shamelessly rubs herself against his face.

He is working so hard to please her, as exhausted as he must be, but even if he was less skilled or enthusiastic, she is so far gone that it wouldn’t take much to push her to the edge. She presses herself further against him and cups her breasts with her hands, as she forces herself to keep her eyes open, even knowing that they are all watching her. She looks at Nicky and Joe, curled up on the bed, their limbs tightly entwined, looks at Andy, who is staring straight at her with open delight in her eyes.

She tries to cling to the moment, fights to drag it out as long as she can, but eventually she finds herself pulled under by the wave of her pleasure, and she allows herself to let go at last.

Then, once her belly stops trembling, once she catches her breath, her hands reach out blindly, coming to rest on Booker’s head. “You are forgiven,” she says quietly, and in that very moment, she isn’t quite certain whether she is talking to Booker or whether she is giving absolution to herself.

It is strange to wake up the next morning. She is alone in her bed, and for a moment she wonders if perhaps it's a dream she remembers, if perhaps it didn’t actually happen at all - but the languid satisfaction enveloping her body makes her quite certain that it did.

It’s early, the house is silent, and she quickly climbs out of bed, half hoping that she can slip outside for a walk without waking the others just yet.

The door to Nicky and Joe’s room is closed as she passes, and she breathes a tiny exhale of relief. Yet when she enters the kitchen, on her way to the front door, she discovers that she isn’t the first one to rise today.

Andy is sitting at the table, and Booker is standing at the stove, and they are watching a soccer match rerun on SkySports, with the volume on the TV switched to mute.

They look at her when she enters, and Andy offers her a smile. They both seem sleepy but relaxed and so _normal_ , far more at ease than the weeks before.

“You want coffee?” Booker asks simply, already pulling down a mug, and she nods and sits down at the kitchen table, because she doesn’t know how else to react.

He pours her coffee from the steaming carafe and adds a spoonful of sugar and cream, then sets it in front of her onto the table, and reaches back towards the counter for his own mug.

“That referee is a _sale fils de pute_ ,” he curses a moment later, gesturing with his coffee at the TV. “That wasn’t a foul, a blind man could see that, for Christ’s sake.”

“Keep telling yourself that,” Andy mocks him fondly, and bites into a slice of toast.

Nile takes a sip of her coffee, watching them, not entirely certain what to think.

Andy glances over, catches her looking, and raises her eyebrows back at her.

“You have questions,” she says quietly, and Nile senses more than she sees Booker tense up next to her.

“Yes,” she says thoughtfully, slowly, and takes another sip of her coffee as she feels their eyes trained on her.

“I thought France was supposed to be better at soccer,” she says finally, and Andy laughs happily when Booker throws an oven mitt at her head.


End file.
